Dave Hitz likes to solve fun problems. He didn't set out to be a Silicon Valley icon, a business visionary, or even a billionaire. But he became all three. It turns out that business is a mosaic of interesting puzzles like managing risk, developing and reversing strategies, and looking into the future by deconstructing the past.As a founder of NetApp, a data storage firm that began as an idea scribbled on a placemat and now takes in $4 billion a year, Hitz has seen his company go through every major cycle in business--from the Jack-of-All-Trades mentality of a start-up, through the tumultuous period of the IPO and the dot-com bust, and finally to a mature enterprise company. NetApp is one of the fastest-growing computer companies ever, and for six years in a row it has been on Fortune magazine's list of Best Companies to Work For. Not bad for a high school dropout who began his business career selling his blood for money and typing the names of diseases onto index cards.With colorful examples and anecdotes, How to Castrate a Bull is a story for everyone interested in understanding business, the reasons why companies succeed and fail, and how powerful lessons often come from strange and unexpected places.Dave Hitz co-founded NetApp in 1992 with James Lau and Michael Malcolm. He served as a programmer, marketing evangelist, technical architect, and vice president of engineering. Presently, he is responsible for future strategy and direction for the company. Before his career in Silicon Valley, Dave worked as a cowboy, where he got valuable management experience by herding, branding, and castrating cattle.

PART ONE: Beginnings.1. Before NetApp On Computers, Colleges, Castration, and Risk.Interlude: What NetApp Does.2. Starting NetApp On Toasters, Angels, Resellers, and Ferraris.Interlude: Redundant Array of Pyramid Hieroglyphics (RAPH).3. CEO Lessons On Pixie Dust, Decision Making, Candor, and Going Public.Interlude: Tom Mendoza's Lessons on Public Speaking.PART TWO: Turbulent Adolescence.4. Hypergrowth On Goals, Doubling, Ancestors, and Pain.Interlude: How to Fail in Executive Staff Presentations.5. Values and Culture On Dilbert, Drooling, Lies, and Game Theory.Interlude: Lawyers Aren't Evil Fairness and Morality Are Not Their Job.6. Managing Engineers On Development, Consensus, Doctor Death, and Magic.Interlude: Scientific-Truth and Useful-Truth.PART THREE: Grown-Up Company.7. Customers On Love, Enterprise, Simplicity, and Partners.Interlude: Shark Island A Parable of Risk and Mass Media.8. Strategic Change On Reversing Course, Chocolate, Debates, and Core Beliefs.Interlude: Speckled-Egg Thinking.9. Vision On Whining, Eras, Future History, and the Meaning of Life.Appendix A. Early NetApp Business Plan.Appendix B. NetApp Company Values.Glossary.Bibliography.Acknowledgments.The Author.Index.